The Sports Blog

The University of New Hampshire men’s hockey team is on its break, so with no game to preview for this weekend, it’s appropriate to take a look back at what’s happened to this point. In short: Oy vey. A dramatic 7-4 win road win over Maine eased what could have been serious holiday blues, but there’s no hiding the fact that the first half has been a disappointment for the Wildcats. Struggles this year were not unforeseen; with the losses UNH endured this past offseason,
0

The University of New Hampshire hockey team is in desperate need of a spark, and normally this would be the last weekend it could expect to get one. Boston College isn’t what it’s been in recent years, however. The Eagles have won three national championships and four Hockey East titles since 2008, but are scuffling through a lukewarm season in which they are having trouble finding the net and playing at a .500 clip (7-7-0, 3-4-0). They’re ranked 17th in the country, but they’re not
0

The University of New Hampshire hockey team has a chance to climb back to .500 both overall and in Hockey East when it faces Northeastern in Durham tonight and in Boston tomorrow. The Wildcats are 3-5, with an 0-2 record in conference after losses to UMass Lowell, while the Huskies are still looking for their first win at 0-7-1 (0-3-1 in Hockey East). Here are a few tidbits from the midweek media conference from Coach Dick Umile and some of his players. ∎ Wildcats stress matching
0

This week in the High School Spotlight, it’s Nathan Smith. Smith, a Concord High student, sings the Star Spangled Banner at some Concord High assemblies, before sporting events and pep rallies, too. You might know him as Rene Rancourt’s mini-doppelgänger. He’s even moonlighted for some other schools around the area. You can see his performance before Saturday's Concord High girls hockey game here. Concord Monitor: How did you get the gig of singing the National Anthem? Nathan Smith: it was offered to kids in my
0

So we’re all supposed to let go and move on, but the tributes that the Celtics and the Boston fans paid to Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett on Sunday night, and the post-game comments about their return to TD Garden, are definitely worth a second look. So here are youtube clips posted by TheBrooklynGame for Pierce and Garnett. And here are the highlights from the press conference after Brooklyn’s 85-79 win. Garnett and Pierce spoke together, taking turns answering one question and often feeding off
0

It’s hard to pinpoint what the emotions should be for the University of New Hampshire hockey team after taking a win and a loss in the always anticipated series with Maine this weekend. After all, UNH (14-13-1, 6-6-0) did score one of its most impressive victories of the year, acing its first test without star defenseman Trevor van Riemsdyk by pulling together, weathering an early Maine attack and striking late in a hard-fought 3-2 win over the Black Bears. The progress made in that win
0

As it turns out, this was the perfect season for Rajon Rondo to become the face of the Celtics franchise. It doesn’t matter that Rondo has only played four games, including Friday’s 101-83 loss against Oklahoma City. Being a Boston fan this year has been more about debating (to tank or not to tank) than rooting, and the polarizing Rondo is nothing if not debatable. Rondo is unlike any other player in the league, maybe ever, so he naturally elicits varying opinions on his value.
0

Here are some of the most interesting quotes coming out of Foxborough from Wednesday and Thursday, via the Patriots media relations department. Tom Brady Q: When you have so many players who haven’t been to the postseason before, do you ever offer advice to them about what to expect? Is it a lead-by-example kind of thing, or do you actually go and talk to somebody about it? TB: Coach (Belichick) handles the team pretty well, so he’s got a great handle on what he thinks
0

Thanksgiving’s hours away – but there’s no rest for the UNH hockey team. The Wildcats are on the road, getting ready to play a weekend series at Colorado College. Once the second game ends, No. 20 UNH will have played 10 games in 23 days, a stretch that has been made all the more grueling for the well-traveled ’Cats with a weekend in Providence and a cross-country trip to Colorado. It hasn’t been an easy slate. But the Wildcats haven’t seemed any worse for the
0

When the UNH men’s hockey team fell to 1-5-1 for the season, it had the benefit of a portion of the schedule coming up that was significantly weaker than the assembly line of national powers it had faced to begin the year. After games against teams like Minnesota, Michigan and UMass Lowell, the Wildcats were facing Massachusetts, Brown and Northeastern, solid teams (NU was ranked going in, after all), but not of the caliber of their previous opponents. And to UNH’s credit, the team capitalized,
0

Call it a comeback, call it improvement, or call it anything else you want. Whatever name you want to slap on it, the 2013-14 season is shaping up to be a memorable one for Nick Sorkin. And for the UNH men’s hockey team, it couldn’t be more timely. Sorkin is leading the resurgent Wildcats offense with seven goals, already just two shy of his career high set two seasons ago. He’s been busy around the net, knocking in feeds and loose pucks that stray away
0

The UNH men’s hockey team wasn’t scoring. And while Dick Umile never strayed from his point that plenty of time remained in the young season, the coach saw that the time was right to make a change. So on Nov. 1, with the Wildcats about to begin a home-and-home series with UMass Lowell, Umile shook things up. The first and second lines were split up, with Kevin Goumas joining Nick Sorkin and Matt Willows on the second line and Dalton Speelman moving up to play
0

Now might be as good a time as any to go over the good news and bad news facing the UNH men’s hockey team. Finding the bad news is easy. Just look around. The Wildcats have been, by far, Hockey East’s least successful team, with a 1-5-1 overall record that is hardly a death sentence but isn’t insignificant either. They’re not scoring. They’re not keeping teams from scoring. They’re not killing penalties, not scoring on the power play, not playing consistently. So on and so
0